It's strange to think that one's position on Donald Trump is worthy of historical import, but it will be

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April 29, 2016 4:20PM (UTC)

In his Friday New York Times column, economist David Brooks argued that unbeknownst to itself, the Republican Party is having "a Joe McCarthy moment" -- meaning that history will judge people by "where they stood at this time," and that those "who walked with Trump will be tainted forever after for the degradation of standards and the general election slaughter."

He wrote that America will, after this election, need "a new national story," because up until now, "America’s story has been some version of the rags-to-riches story, the lone individual who rises from the bottom through pluck and work." That story doesn't work anymore, because as the relative successes of the Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders campaigns have demonstrated, people believe that system is rigged:

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I don’t know what the new national story will be, but maybe it will be less individualistic and more redemptive. Maybe it will be a story about communities that heal those who suffer from addiction, broken homes, trauma, prison and loss, a story of those who triumph over the isolation, social instability and dislocation so common today.